אדם קדמון

אדם קדמון, the aspect of the רצון about all the worlds that arose in the מחשבה הקדומה . It is the כתר הכללי of סדר השתלשלות. Just as each particular world begins with כתר, which is the הרצון פרטי for that world, so too, the entirety of all worlds begin with the general כתר of אדם קדמון.

Although all details of the worlds—from the highest to the lowest, across all six thousand years—arise within this רצון, they do not appear in a state of התחלקות. Rather, they are all seen as one. As Chazal say, “They are all seen with הבטה אחת,” meaning He sees all generations at once.

This unity in אדם קדמון is because it draws from the רצון הכללי that precedes the צמצום. In this paradox—detail-oriented will and a single glance—lie the two powers of אור אין סוף: the capacity for expansion (התפשטות) in the multitude of details, and the power of contraction (צמצום) in one unified view. The reason אדם קדמון sees all in one הבטה is that אין סוף is above time.

The root of time emerges only through צמצום and התפשטות, which create temporal sequence. But since אדם קדמון is the first emanation from Him, and contains just one צמצום and התפשטות, it results in a single, timeless הבטה. Time begins only when the flow is divided, each part following the removal of the previous—thus producing many רגעים.